Мальдивы – райское наслаждение! Maldives - heavenly delight!

Maldives - heavenly delight! We were in the Maldives for the first time. Rested in March 2015. The dream of relaxing in the Maldives haunted us, my son and I really wanted to go there. The choice of the island and the hotel was approached “from afar” - two weeks of monitoring and studying the islands with a house reef (this was the main condition for choosing a hotel), hotel rating, price-quality ratio and setting your own priority for hotels. After studying a lot of reviews and videos - we got a list of hotels. When choosing a tour operator, we settled on Tez-Tour (because others either have a much higher price, or you need to make some additional payments in addition to the main tour, for example, a transfer, and it costs a lot of money in the Maldives). The choice fell on the Fihalhohi Island hotel, but when we asked for places at the hotel, we were refused (there are no places). The next hotel on the "list" was Fun Island. Availability was confirmed immediately. All documents (voucher, insurance, plane tickets) were received by e-mail. And then came the long-awaited vacation. Flight. Departure from Vnukovo. Airline - Transaero. Check-in for the flight took place in advance via the Internet (very convenient when choosing seats on the plane). Boeing 777-200 aircraft, 9 seats in a row, the distance between the seats is 81 cm - for a long-distance flight - “the very thing”. The flight departure was delayed for 40 minutes, but this is not critical - after all, the Maldives is ahead! There were a sufficient number of empty seats on the plane, and those who were quicker took them for a comfortable “flight-sleep” (including us). During the flight, the entry migration cards were filled out. Flying up to Male, you experience a storm of emotions when you see small islands with lagoons and azure water from a height from an airplane window. The airport in Male is small. Landing - passport control - a suitcase - a meeting by a Tez-Tour representative at the airport with free bottles of water - and we are rushing on a boat along the "azure waters of the Maldives" past beautiful island hotels. Having sailed for 15 minutes, the captain of the boat invited his son to take the helm of the boat. The son experienced a storm of positive emotions and a sea of ​ ​ adrenaline while driving a boat with tourists all the way to the island. There was only one couple of tourists from India on the boat with us. Only 40 minutes sailed to the hotel, because. Bodufinolhu Island is located in South Male Atoll, 38 km from the airport from Male International Airport. The Maldives greeted us with sunshine and there were no cloudy days throughout the holiday (only once there was a tropical downpour at night, lasting about two hours). In general, we were lucky with the weather! Island hotel. At the pier we were met by representatives of the hotel. They were not allowed to carry the suitcase themselves - such a gesture of courtesy. A few tens of meters along the pier, at the entrance to the reception there are cool wet towels for hotel guests, and here we are filling out hotel guest cards, drinking a cool cocktail. After reading the reviews in advance, we asked to be placed in rooms from 135 to 155 (on the left side of the reception), but there were no free places in them and we were placed in room 114 (on the right side of the reception), promising that if we didn’t like it, then they will give us another number the next day (but we did not change it). We were alone on the island from Russia, and the bulk of the tourists were Chinese, Italians, Germans and a few Indians. One-storey bungalows are located among the trees just 20-30 meters from the beach. While walking to our house, I was a little upset when I saw that the island seemed to be a little “bald” and “rustic”. The island itself is medium in size by Maldivian standards - 700x168 meters. There are two islands nearby: on the first (on the right, when viewed from the pier) is the OLHUVELI BEACH & SPA RESORT 4 hotel, and the second (on the left, when viewed from the pier) is the uninhabited colorful Robinson. Photos of the Fun Island hotel on the Internet on the official website of the hotel are true. The reception and dining room are located in the middle of the island, and to the right and left of them there are one-story bungalows with two or three rooms in each detached house. There is no pool in the hotel. If you look at the island from the pier, then on the left side on the outskirts of the island there is a sandy spit - this is a local beach, and on the right side of the island (from the very edge) there is an abandoned building, a generator and a house where the hotel staff lives. WI-fi is really free (a rarity for this level of hotels) and without a password, but only near the bar. I measured the speed: 5.5 Mbps - reception and 2 Mbps - transmission --- for Skype, Viber, FaseTime - plenty (I checked and used it myself, because I didn’t think to buy a local SIM card). There are no Russian-speaking staff in the hotel. I had to resort to the help of a translator on the tablet. The deposit at the reception was not taken. The hotel has table tennis (ping-pong), American billiards - free of charge. A suitcase was brought to our room. Standard room: spacious and simple - nothing more (the most important thing is air conditioning). From the room there is a second exit to the street ("type into the courtyard"). The bathroom is combined, hot and cold water is available with good pressure. The lamps are equipped with energy-saving light bulbs (after all, electricity in the Maldives is worth its weight in gold). There is no safe in the room (it is at the reception, you need to fill out a card and you will be given the key to the safe. If the key is lost, the fine is $ 75). The room has a free tea set (tea and coffee), a kettle, cups, telephone, umbrellas, toilet and beach towels. 1 small bottle of drinking water per person (500 ml) is placed daily in the room free of charge. Rooms are cleaned daily with towels replaced with clean ones. In the fridge-bar, everything is paid, there is a memo on the hotel in Russian. Adapters for Russian plugs are already installed in electrical outlets. Voltage 220 volts. There are no TVs in standard rooms. The hotel's rooms need a little cosmetic repairs (but it's bearable). Water in the taps is technical to drink and cannot be boiled! Before entering the room on the street there is a tap for rinsing your feet from sand - very convenient. Large ants (2 cm each) come to the bathroom at night, but at the first request (as if at the behest of a pike), hotel employees come running with some kind of chemical preparations to eliminate them. We got dressed and went to have lunch. In the dining room - buffet: breakfast 7-30 to 10-00, lunch 12-30 to 14-00, dinner 19-30 to 21-00. The waiters are young guys, very helpful. Food: a variety of dishes - if you don’t find fault, then everything is “normal”. Drinks: tea, coffee, milk, juice (water and beer for a fee). Main dishes: one or two types of “unexplored soup”, sandwiches, potatoes, pasta, broccoli, fish, two or three types of meat, sausages, chicken eggs (for breakfast, scrambled eggs, locally prepared scrambled eggs). Baking - fresh (probably baked right on the island). Fruits and all possible salads and many unfamiliar dishes that were not even suitable for (it was enough "familiar dishes"). If the hotel is full of tourists and all the tourists come to eat, then there will not be enough space for everyone in the dining room and you will have to wait! (it is a fact). Food is fresh, no complaints. I won’t talk much about food, we love to eat delicious and we know what delicious is, it was delicious for us, everyone found a set of dishes that suits their taste! If you take additional drinks at the bar or in the dining room (mineral water, beer, etc. ), then you don’t need to pay in cash - a waiter comes up with a check, you put a signature, and when you leave the hotel, you pay for all checks. The price of draft beer is Maldivian $ 13.55 per 1 liter. Rest. On the day of arrival, having had lunch, smeared with sunscreen (protection 50), we went snorkeling and getting acquainted with the underwater world of the Maldives. Masks, snorkels, fins we brought with us. I asked the tourists who had previously been here where it is better to snorkel. The best snorkeling on Fun Island is only at the end of the pier (i. e. , at the place where the boat docks upon arrival). There is a special ladder for easy descent, and there is also a house reef (barrier (deep), and which leads to the beach (shallow). In terms of snorkeling, the experience is not great, but we were very impressed by the beauty and richness of the underwater world we saw. On the first day, we snorkeled for only 1.5 hours and got very badly burned (they were smeared with sunscreen (protection 50) - the sun in the Maldives is very strong and swimming (snorkeling) during the day is best in long-sleeved T-shirts. The next day we did just that. On the second day of our stay on the island, we found a place where the stingrays are fed (where the staff lives and (or) where the diving center is located on the map of the island on the right side). The stingrays are fed at 16-00 by tourists in the presence of a hotel employee. - free. Amazing spectacle: by 16-00, as if on command, stingrays (10-12 pieces) swim to the place of "feeding". The hotel employee cuts the fish into pieces and starts feeding. The stingray, as if a vacuum cleaner, sucks food (fish) in the mouth, which is located below They eat only sliced ​ ​ fish (they don’t eat meat). All interested tourists join the “feeding meal. ” It seems that the stingrays are just tame creatures, they sort of flap their wings and try to “jump out of the water” in order to you get a fish. It even seemed to me that they, like kittens, love when they are stroked on the frontal part between the eyes. There are not very many tourists, I think that not everyone knows about this event (after all, there is no advertising). We were at this event and took part more than once. It is difficult to describe this spectacle - you need to participate in it! The beaches are everywhere on this island. From the side of the pier (to the right and left), but the entry into the water is not very comfortable (there are old corals and stones), the entry is smooth - there is no depth, almost the lagoon of the island. Clean sand is only on the spit on the left side of the island. There are ebbs and flows. The beach on the ocean side (the eastern part of the island), it seemed to me, was not suitable for swimming at all, only for sunbathing, although there is a very beautiful view (a large ocean wave breaks on the reef on the horizon). Separately, I want to focus on the uninhabited island of Robinson. It is located on the left side of the hotel. Every day, a motor boat with willing tourists sails to it for free at 10-00, and picks it up from the island at 12-00. You just need to register in advance at the reception. The size of Robinson Island is approximately 150x50 meters. The boat sails 5 minutes. You can also swim (or wade at low tide) to try, but there is a current. We didn't. “Landing” on this island you immediately get the complete feeling that you are IN THE MALDIVES - the purest sand, five or six colored water, and there is plenty of greenery on the island. Tourists go to the island mainly for photo shoots. Well, we did not miss such a chance. Even crabs and herons on this island “posed for a photo” for us. We were there twice (one time was not enough to "absorb such positive emotions"). There is practically no evening entertainment in the hotel (we only saw crab races). In the evening, basically everyone is on the Internet. But the moment when huge manta rays (about 3 meters) come to the pier, where the boats moor, deserves special attention. Arrive around 10-11 pm. There is night lighting and it seems that manta rays are coming to pose for a photo shoot. . We even filmed a fragment when one of the stingrays performed a “dead loop” and its abdomen was clearly visible! And against the backdrop of floating manta rays, a little further (about 20 meters) three or four meter sharks are “on duty”, and some predatory fish go hunting at night. A spectacle with unique sensations !! ! We were there three evenings in a row for two hours, it's a pity that we found out about it late. I will say briefly about the beauty of the underwater world - THIS IS COOL!! ! It's impossible to describe - you have to see it! They took an underwater camera with them, brought 5 GB of photo and video material. Snorkeling almost every day (and sometimes 2 times - in the morning and in the evening) for about 2 hours. Under the pier itself there are a lot of beautiful fish with bright colors. One day after dinner we saw a turtle - we swam after it. And she seemed to understand that I was filming her, after posing for a bit (enough for video and photos), she swam onto a shallow reef, finally waving her fin at me. Also, when snorkelling, we saw "wild" rays, coral sharks, octopus. My son most of all liked to disperse schools of colored fish. We went on an excursion to the Maldivian village on the island of Guraidhoo. In the local life of the inhabitants of the Maldives, there are no such bright colors as on the islands-hotels. We saw a mosque, a generator (as an attraction), a school, a kindergarten, a small fishing port. Everything is much simpler there, even a little sad. When we sailed on a boat to the island, we saw dolphins and the captain even turned the boat around so that we could enjoy this spectacle! The males, as if on command, rushed to the boat, diverting attention to themselves, and the females swam in the other direction. In conclusion, I can say that the holiday was a success, although the first impressions of the Fun Island Resort hotel were a little alarming. This is a great place for a budget holiday in the Maldives, where there is almost everything. This island has a beautiful house reef (we even saw a few boats from other islands with divers); sparse vegetation is compensated by the good ventilation of the island by the sea breeze, and there is enough shade for comfort; Robinson Island makes a good "weight" in a positive direction - there is simply a Maldivian PARADISE; Responsive and good-natured staff does not extort tips and quickly responds to requests from tourists. Do not buy souvenirs either on the island or on excursions - buy everything at Male airport in Duty Free, there is more choice and cheaper. I recommend sunbathing only from morning until 11-00 and after 15-00, because in the afternoon there in the sun - tin. During the rest we saw a lot of marine life of the equatorial waters of the Indian Ocean. And the fact that in many reviews they write that there is nothing to do in the Maldives is not true: it’s just that the rest here is kind of Maldivian.